


Loving You as the Earth Grows Dark

by jer832



Series: Let Me Count the Ways [4]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: "Let Me Count the Ways", Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Drama & Romance, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Fix-It of Sorts, Internal Monologue, Missing Scene, Romance, Season/Series 01, Stand Alone
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-25
Updated: 2014-07-25
Packaged: 2018-02-10 10:04:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,332
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2020923
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jer832/pseuds/jer832
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Be careful what you wish for</i>, the Doctor had told Rose Tyler. He didn't follow his own advice, but he wouldn't be the Doctor if he had.  As Reapers bring mayhem and death to Earth, within a church growing dark and dense with hopeless despair, love and hope and passion unfold, and lovers caress, and the Doctor finds he is something more – something bigger – than a Time Lord.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Loving You as the Earth Grows Dark

**Author's Note:**

> JessaLRynn and Olfactory_Ventriloquism hosted a Series 1 ficathon on livejournal, the point of which was to add the shagging scenes we all knew should be there. A group of us took the entire series and gave Jessa and O.V. _"Let Me Count the Ways"_ (posted on Teaspoon, authored by LMCTW; and at the adult comm, bad-wolf-rising.livejournal.com.) Recognizable dialog and situations in this _stand-alone story_ are from the original teleplay of "Father's Day" by Paul Cornell. .
> 
>  
> 
> This story was for Jessa, for her 2013 birthday.

 

 

 

 

 Loving You As the Earth Grows Dark

 

 

 

"So I was thinking… Could we go and see my dad when he was still alive?"

"Where's this come from all of a sudden, Rose?"

Rose shrugged, not really certain. She hardly ever thought about the dad who had died before she was old enough to know him. Even her mum seldom talked about him anymore, except that after 10 Downing when Rose was at Jackie's packing to go off with the Doctor and the both of them had gotten their hackles up about some things (mostly Doctory things), in the middle of it all Jackie told Rose that her dad would be proud of her.

The Doctor was always asking her what she wanted to do, where she wanted to go; he always grinned when she came up with a suggestion and said _Your wish is my command, just be careful what you wish for_. But maybe, Rose thought, going back to see her dad wasn't the same thing as going to 1860 and seeing Charles Dickens. "All right then, if we can't– if it goes against the laws of time or somethin', then never mind, Doctor, we'll just leave it."

"No, I…I can do anything. I'm just more worried about you. That's a dangerous thing you're asking for, Rose–dangerous for you–seeing him alive and happy with your mum, knowing he's gonna die, knowing how, thinking what might have been instead."

"Yeah. I never knew my dad 'cept from Mum's stories and photos, and sometimes I just wonder… " She sighed. "I just wish I could have seen him, just once."

"I love seeing you smile, Rose Tyler, I love making you happy, but…" The Time Lord grinned, though his grin was not quite as bright as usual, and repeated the litany. "Your wish is my command, just be careful what you wish for."

The Doctor started up to the console but Rose grabbed his arm and pulled him back. She slipped her arms inside his jacket and wrapped them around his waist, kissed him lightly on the cheek, just as lightly on the lips. "You always do things to make me happy, Doctor. If seeing my dad is not a good idea, if it's not all right, we shouldn't do it. End of discussion."

"Rose–"

"No. It's fine. Really. I'm fine. I won't bring it up again. I promise." Rose cuddled into the Doctor's embrace. "'Sides, there's something else seems I brought up, yeah?" she said huskily as his arms tightened around her, drawing her even closer.

The Doctor chuckled wickedly, invitation smouldering in his eyes. Grinning that lethal grin of hers, Rose wiggled her hand down inside the front of his denims. He grinned smugly. Then he moaned. Rose's fingers teased through the soft short curls covering his groin, plucking mischievously, her nails scratching lightly– all more than enough, the Doctor was sure, to drive a lesser Time Lord insane. Her hand closed around the erection that seemed to happen whenever Rose was anywhere near him. She planted wet kisses in the hollow of his throat. Then her tongue started a slow swath up, through the light stubble covering his throat and against the underside of his jaw, followed the bend and turn of his chin, circled his lips and pushed inside with a gentle twist and a heated, Rose Tyler-scented sigh. The Doctor's clever brain went a little bit fuzzy considering all the tantalizing implications, the exquisite torments ahead.

Rose's mouth flitted over the Doctor's face and neck with playful kisses. The Doctor's fingers slipped under Rose's top. He scraped his nails across the flats of her nipples and her body jerked forward on a gasp. He pushed her tank top and bra out of his way and descended with a swiftness that made Rose squeal. With light quick caresses his mouth and fingers made love to her breasts. She stroked up and down his neck and through his hair, caressed his sac, barely touching him but so much more than enough.

Caress and lick… pinch and roll… scrape and tease. Suddenly Rose nipped the Doctor's chin and squeezed him firmly. He jolted against her, hissing her name and a Gallifreyan exclamation that the TARDIS didn't translate. Rose giggled, backing away to grin up at him. Gripping her under her skirt so firmly that his fingers persuaded the creamy skin of her bum into a warm cherry pink, the Doctor pulled Rose against him hard, held her that way and ground them together until she mewed and the fire in his own groin demanded more... more.

Rose unbuttoned the Doctor's trousers, eased his erection free, and started to inch the sturdy denim over his bum and down his legs. To the Doctor's super-sensitized skin it was like sandpaper on marble. Then Rose's lips–his Rose's soft, sweet, fantastic lips–brushed over the head of his penis. She took him into her mouth and played with him until his breathing was as unsteady as hers despite his respiratory bypass. When Rose sat back on her heels to smile at the Doctor they both were panting. Of course they both also were grinning.

She let her nails drift over his hips' bony edging into the tender, utterly sensitive furrows leading them to his groin. When they reached their destination they wandered him, drifting haphazardly across his smooth sac and impatient penis, his stomach, his deceptively firm yet very sensitive (at least to her attentions) bum and backs of his thighs, sighed unhurriedly down his legs, before she finally helped him step out of his shoes and denims. Then Rose lost all interest in teasing the Doctor and simply yanked his socks off. Just as impatient as Rose had finally become, he pulled her up off the floor and started to lift her onto him.

She stopped him.

"Doctor, you've given me everythin' I've ever wanted, and I know you'd do anythin' you can for me; but I don't want you _ever_ to feel you have to do somethin' that you think is wrong because of me. Right now, all I want is to see you come completely undone in my mouth. I want to feel you and taste you, the Oncomin' Storm; I want you not to hold back. Is that all right?"

The Doctor took Rose's hand and led her to the jump seat, pulling her down to her knees in front of him as he edged his long body onto the arm.

"That's another dangerous thing to ask for," he whispered hoarsely; but he didn't want her to change her mind, so he wrapped his fingers into Rose's long hair and pushed her head to his erection.

Rose took a long, thorough taste from the base of his shaft to the head. With the edge of a fingernail she began writing her name in Gallifreyan script over his skin. As this woman he so cherished scribbled _mine_ along his shaft, the Doctor had the thought what a fantastic idea it had been after all to teach Rose some of his language. But then her mouth encircled the head with exquisite suction and she hummed blissfully around him, and the vibrations and her busy fingers made him shout. The Doctor's fingers clenched and unclenched in Rose's hair and he mumbled to himself, Gallifreyan mostly though some of it was gibberish, as his Rose made the cosmos stop moving then turned it around. She kissed the tip then pulled back and looked up. The Doctor's eyes burned down at her, fixed on her mouth.

"Should I be careful what I wish for?" Rose asked.

"Always," the Doctor rasped. His fingers tightened in Rose's hair and he pushed into her mouth.

 

 

True to her word, Rose didn't bring up the matter of her dad again, but several days later the Doctor took Rose back after all. Took her back again to be with her dad so he wouldn't die alone. It was a very dangerous thing to do in so many ways and the Doctor knew it; but more than anything he wanted to make Rose happy. From the moment she had come back to Henricks to save him, he was hers, and he wished with both his hearts he could give her everything she'd ever want.

_Be careful what you wish for_ , the Doctor had told Rose Tyler. He didn't follow his own advice, but he wouldn't be the Doctor if he had.

 

 

~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~

 

**_"He can't die on his own. Can I try again?"_ **

 

~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~

 

 

**_"Everyone– Behind me!"_ **

**I am the _last_ Time Lord** and here I am blithely walking to my death. Actually I'm standing and waiting for it to come and gobble me down, but walking sounds better, sounds more in keeping with the whole Oncoming Storm thing I got myself stuck with, and though the other is more accurate it's not as simple as it sounds. Except for dying of old age that first time, I never just stood around waiting for death to find me, and now I choose to die with a free will. Dying is nothing new for me. Neither is coming back– for a Time Lord it's all a bit like getting yourself a new outfit. There've been times I was really fed up with the tailor and all the try-ons; last regeneration, beginning of this, I'd've just said _leave me be, I'm done_ and walked before this lot like that Emperor in my naked guilt and self-pity, a suit I suspect I wear better than velvet and lace. Now I wait for death with two hearts so full of regret.

I am about to die, yeah, but this time there's a critical difference. This time I won't regenerate, this time it's Reapers. But this time… _oh, Rassilon_ , this time there is Rose and I want so much to live!

Of course one thing is patently the same this time as always: it's all by my own doing. And I'd better figure this one out fast because once I'm gone there won't be any Time Lords to fix what's happening to Earth.

Things went pear-shaped so quickly after I mucked up Pete Tyler's timeline, I had to laugh at my phenomenal knack for timing. Before I could even talk to Rose about what had happened, her very much alive dad insisted on taking us back to his and Jackie's and baby Rose's flat. Adult Rose ran inside eagerly, ignoring my attempt to take her hand as if I were as dead as Tyler was meant to be. She larked about, touching everything and babbling on happily, careless of the salinity of paradox in the air, blind and deaf to the temporal vulnerability she had mistaked Tyler's place into.

I knew. Battered and just about brought to my knees by the growing tempest of violently oscillating possibilities I had unleashed, I literally needed a strong solid wall to hold me up as I tried to follow each viable entelechy that was unfolding from the bud of Peter Tyler's being alive. And then… _AND THEN_ …

My _LOVER_ –the woman I once might have let Earth die for and might just have after all–stared me in the eyes and didn't blink and said… _"Okay, look... I'll tell him you're not my boyfriend."_

Rose Tyler thinks on her feet and she makes me see critical connections between seemingly unconnected things. These are two of the things I've loved most about her and one of the reasons I asked her to come with me in the first place. But those were two things I suddenly hated her for. _"When we met, I said 'travel with me in space'. You said no. Then I said 'time machine'."_

_Rose oh Rose, it all didn't mean anything after all! Love, you didn't care!_

For one moment, just one moment, I wondered if the only thing really impressive about the Last Time Lord was my lascivious and pathetic fixation on Rose Tyler. No. If I won't be honest with myself when I'm about to die, when in the name of Gallifrey will I? It's because I love Rose more than life, and it's obvious to me now more than even reason and morality, that I had done one of the most dangerous things I've ever done in my lives.

_"So it's okay when YOU go to other times, and YOU save people's lives, Doctor, but not when it's me saving my dad. You offered sanctuary to a murderous blob of livin' plastic that wanted to destroy all us humans, and leniency to a bunch of fartin' cartoon monsters plannin' to turn Earth into radioactive sludge. Why can't you offer my father the chance at life that you offered them? He's not a psycho murderin' piece of skin; he hasn't turned against his own kind. His soul is good and his body isn't stolen; he's just a bloke who couldn't hurt anyone even if he tried! Why are you treatin' him worse than them?"_

I told her that I knew what I was doing and she didn't and two sets of us being there had made it a vulnerable point. Rose couldn't have known that before, of course; she wasn't a Time Lord. I should have explained before I brought her back here.

I shouldn't have brought her back here.

_"But he's alive!"_ As far as Rose was concerned, it was a _fait accompli_ , a done deal, end of discussion.

_"My entire planet died, Rose…my whole family. Do you think it never occurred to me to go back and save them? No, of course not!–not my **EVERY** waking minute and most of the others. And certainly not NOW… even after all this time… Now that I've come to terms with the silence."_

Or should have. At that moment–at that one insane, hearts-stopping, hopeful, squandered fleck out of time, I wondered. Oh Romana forgive me, I really wondered– What if I did go back, what if I could give them the chance to live again, now, with the Daleks gone! I'm clever, I could find a way to bring back Gallifrey and rewrite our history. Rose would have her dad and I would have my family, my people, my home.

If she hadn't been so over the moon for her dad, Rose would have said something to make me realize that a living Pete Tyler wasn't the fix to a simple temporal paradox but the opening of a wound. Reality was bleeding out of itself on tidal waves of damaged temporal energy that would buckle the foundation of normal space. My clever Rose would have asked a question then, or made some comment, and tuned my mind to a way to repair the wound. My Rose would not have given me that one glorious, wasted moment of insane hope for my people–

_"But it's not like I've changed HISTORY, Doctor. Not much, I mean. He's never gonna be a world leader, he's not gonna start World War Three or anythin'!"_

–and then rived it along with my daft fantasy, leaving me only the bloodied sinews of a capricious soul. What happened to the Time Lord I was? Is this where stealing a broken old TARDIS and gaming at disobedience have finally brought me? If anything was ever a certainty it is that every act, every event, creates ripples of cause and effect through space and time. In bringing back Gallifrey, I could destroy star systems and cause the genocide of civilizations. At the very least I would rape _this_ set reality.

Destroyer of Worlds, the Daleks had called me. What would I be if I did it all again? I scare myself thinking how close I came! I am standing here in front of a Reaper, about to be torn apart in a final agonizing death, I am literally out of time with nothing but one harebrained idea to get us all out of this. Yet _that_ … **_THAT_** is why I tremble!

At least Rose's words had made me realize I needed to get back to the TARDIS immediately to search out the ripple effects of her dad being alive. I had to troll the time lines, see what damage I had done and fix it. I didn't have time to explain the situation to Rose–

No, I am a Time Lord; I have time. I just don't often bother with it.

_"What? Would you rather him dead!"_

_"I'm not SAYING that–"_

_"No, I get it! He's not someone you can ridicule as just a pretty boy, or pretend you care sod all about because everythin' about him is beneath you, even rememberin' his name. He is_ PETER TYLER, _he is_ MY FATHER, _and for once YOU are not the most important man in my life!"_

Rose and I fought some more and I demanded the TARDIS key back, which was not the most impressive and clever use of my brain. Rose said something that was horribly cruel and hurting and not true since that basement in Cardiff, maybe even since _run_.

Her eyes screamed out to me that she knew she'd done something unutterably dangerous and was terrified, that her lashing out at me was the only defense she had to throw up against it. But I was shaken to the core of my soul, too righteously angered to care. I don't know if I felt more physically ill at having been used by this woman I'd fallen so hard for, or at the damage I probably caused the Earth in taking Rose to see her dad, or at the damage I would have caused throughout the universe if I hadn't come to my senses about Gallifrey.

Oh _Rassilon_ , who am I kidding?

What I had caused was worse than I'd imagined–but it always turns out to be. My TARDIS was gone; I couldn't hold the time line and repair the damage all on my own. Reapers had brought the sound and fury of sterilization to an Earth writhing in its noose of disassociated reality. Across the terminally wounded Earth, billions of substanceless lives chattered voicelessly, unknowingly. The waning shadows of a lost bride and groom and other desperate souls entreated me in their absent god's darkening abode, but I didn't know how to save them. I didn't know how to save any of them.

They deserved to know what I had done to them. Rose deserved to know. _"There's been an accident in time, a wound in time."_

I tried to explain. Jackie Tyler started to argue, of course– world was ending, everyone about to die a horrible agony-filled death… Jackie mouths off! Why should today be any different?

Oh, I let Jackie have it! When the harridan asked how I knew her, I almost laughed. When she said _Yes sir_ and immediately did as I told her, I actually grinned. Tyler gave me a cold distrusting glare like he sussed I was banging the Wicked Witch of the Council Estate. The idea of it would have made me ill if I hadn't been so sick already. Ironically it led me to this moment and the only chance we have.

When I realized that the inside of the TARDIS was still connected to my key and I could bring her back, the first thought I had was that that I could save my Rose. It wasn't the first thought _The Last Time Lord_ should have had, but I am sick of pretending that I'm anything but a bloke in love. It strikes me now, after talking to Sarah and Stuart street corner two in the morning, that being a bloke in love is better than being a Time Lord–maybe not better, just bigger on the inside. I want to remember it if…when I come back. For Rose. For us.

With the TARDIS I could mend the wound in Time and stop the Reapers' sterilization of Earth. I could fix it so Pete Tyler would still be alive and Rose would have had the chance to grow up with her dad. But the beauty of it was I could keep her with me as well–I'd keep my Rose!

What makes it possible–what makes the crucial and fantastic difference–is that Rose has been traveling with the TARDIS and me. She'd changed her dad's future, so she wasn't going to be looped into growing up fatherless and going back to try to fix things. But she wouldn't be part of the changed reality the way Pete and Jackie and the others would. Like a springboard diver, Rose had touched a substantive reality, made it vibrate, moved it; but she was already away from it when it moved into actuality, balanced in the rarefied air of a time traveller.

I knew that Rose would come away with two sets of memories, her original memories of growing up without a dad and the new memories that Pete's being alive would have effected in the altered time line. Could there be another Rose all grown up and living her another-Rose life? Could be, if I would create an alternate time line with that Rose. But that wasn't what I was aiming to do, and I really am impressive when I stop mucking about.

There's nothing wrong with paradox, only a certain sort of paradox. I would help Rose sort out her memories at the nexus where one set of her life experiences had to become dominant. My Rose is brilliant and that's nothing to what I've seen her do. Maybe she'd be at the Tyler family Christmas table then run off with me in the TARDIS for New Year's–could do if Rose wanted. The point is that my Rose would remember growing up with Pete and Jackie, and she'd remember growing up fatherless and Henricks and me taking her hand and us coming back and her saving her father's life. The really important point far as I was concerned was that we would still have had our time together and Rose would still remember all of it. She could have her family, but she'd also have me if she still wanted–and I planned to make bloody sure she wanted! For once in my lives since before I lost Susan, I'd be honest with myself and most especially with Rose. There's this thing I've put off saying, and I swore on that TARDIS key burning in my hand, with the hope burning in my hearts, that when the TARDIS and I had things fixed, I'd tell her. Maybe then she'd be brave enough to say it back to me.

Then Jackie opened her big mouth as usual, and Pete handed Rose the baby.

I am about to be eaten by Reapers. Pete Tyler's situation is nothing more than a slipknot in a string and they have no bloody right! But there's no arguing with big brainless paradox junkies. All I can think is that after all these hundreds of years of me stepping in and saving the Earth, this time it might just actually be doomed and it's all my fault. No, all I really am thinking about is saving the woman I love and getting back to be with her.

Time is in flux and realities dance on the head of a pin. Even if this Earth is doomed, there will be something to compensate the universe for the loss, there will be something…

But it wouldn't be _my Rose_ and I will _never_ accept that! There are no other Time Lords, my TARDIS is gone, I am alone. To save the Earth and my Rose now will take a miracle.

**_"I'm the oldest thing in here."_ **

 

 

~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~

 

 

**We're going to die, my Sarah and I** , and everyone here. I know it, at least I ought. These monsters, these impossible things, are killing us off one by one. Eating us, to be exact. They ate Auntie Alma and Uncle Hilary, and George and Celeste, and Lila and Father O'Brien and the Doctor, and a full three-quarters of our guests, and I am fairly certain that the Baxters and Uncle Steven, and all the other guests who didn't show have suffered the same fate. Given his attitude to this marriage, Dad would find it all chillingly appropriate, I believe, although Dad is gone as well, eaten by the monsters.

We are going to die. And yet I cannot believe that that will be the case. This insane belief that I shan't let go of is not the delusion of a mind that won't face a horrific truth. Indeed, I am if anything a pragmatic man–

No, I feel Sarah's hand in mine, and it's time to admit I am a romantic, perhaps not by birthright but by miracle– miracles, to be precise. Meeting Sarah was my first miracle. She gave me my second and today would have been my third. I believe, romantic that I am, that I have been given a fourth miracle in this man who calls himself the Doctor, and he will succeed in finding his way back to save us as he said.

The Doctor said we are important, Sarah and I. I don't see how I can be, but Sarah is and the child we've made together is; so I shall take the Doctor at his word in this too, I shall accept that meeting Sarah made me important, and the two a.m. cab ride altered my existence, taking it from mundane to miraculous.

I choose miracles. That is one difference that Sarah has made in my life, a difference my poor father could not understand. The Doctor understands miracles and I believe in him. Sarah is crying silently, but the attitude of her hand as it embraces mine tells me she too believes in this Doctor and his miracle.

She has always believed in me, my darling, and how could that be anything but another miracle? My life has been full of miracles, most especially the child our love has created. She is gorgeous, my bride. Sarah is special and brilliant and miraculous; she deserves a fairy-tale wedding. I shan't dwell on the distressingly Bettelheimian implications of our situation. Instead I shall dwell on my beautiful Sarah.

We are alone in a quiet, private part of the church. Her head is on my shoulder, my arm around her and holding her to me. One of her hands caresses mine, one is caressing her beautiful baby bump. Her fingers entwine mine with a resolve that lets me know she will not allow my hand to be removed from hers for any reason. She squeezes my hand and whispers knowingly. _"The Doctor will find a way back to save us, darling. His eyes and his smile promised hope, and I know he is a man who doesn't break his promises."_

It is easy to give Sarah an honest smile and agree, for I believe in the Doctor's miracle. (The discredited pragmatist in me, blaggard that he is, gives me a derisive laugh. I beat him soundly. It feels quite good.) I kiss my bride's cheek and tell her I only wish that this disagreeable little diversion could have waited to manifest itself until we had said our vows.

" _Insolent Reapers_ ," my darling says, as the church grows darker, colder, " _and such wretched timing_."

Sarah's look is full of humour and love and more than a little vexation at the state of affairs that our wedding day has become. But then she turns on me that smile she uses to tantalize me to shag her. I admit I am not as scandalized by it as I should be… or by my sudden arousal. My Lord, I am scandalized not at all! Apparently I am in equal parts a romantic and a knave. With a smile, I drop to my knees before her.

_"I am yours, Sarah, and I always shall be. I, Stuart, take you–"_ I waggle my eyebrows at her and she gasps but cannot stop giggling. _"I take you Sarah, to be my wife and partner, my helpmeet, the mother of my children. You are the first and greatest miracle of my life–"_

Am I seriously doing this?! Yes.

_"I promise before God and Heaven, before these Monsters of Hell that I shall cleave unto you and honour you; I shall be your shield and your rock. Our children are the jewels of your womb, the victory of our love; I shall provide for them and educate them; I shall love them with all my heart. I shall endeavour never to let you down. I shall endeavour to be all that you desire and need. I shall endeavour–"_

Enough with the holy texts! I waggle my eyebrows again. _"–not to muss your lovely dress."_

I carefully gather the voluminous skirt in my hands and raise it slowly. Sarah smiles again–that smile!–and mine answers. As I drop to my knees before her and delve beneath the cloud of silk and pearls and lace, I hear her say, so solemnly, _"I Sarah, take thee Stuart."_ But my darling cannot stifle another giggle.

My hands caress Sarah's bare legs. I tickle those sensitive spots on the backs of her knees and she rewards me with another giggle; but it is softer this time, followed by a bit of an unsteady sigh that grows into a low moan as my fingers travel up the most sensitive parts of her thighs. I encounter her garter and briefly toy with the lace and elastic, delighting a fingernail between it and her delicate silken skin. " _Something borrowed; something blue_ ," she chokes. I drop a light dry kiss over the garter.

My intention was to hurry on, but Sarah has shivered at my kiss and I, knave that I have become, must torment her some more. As my palms push gently against her inner thighs, she opens her legs. I slide her knickers down her legs slowly, and she steps out of them. My hands encircle her lovely bum, I pull her to me, marveling as always at her warmth and scent, and then her exquisite taste. I can never get enough of her; I am ready for her any time, any place, and I cannot help but chuckle: this truth is now God's truth! As I play through her folds, nipping and tasting, and my darling trembles around the heat of my breath, I wonder if any other man would make such holy communion? I rather think the Doctor would, for I've seen the way he looks at Rose.

My tongue has found Sarah's clitoris. She is mewing for me and whispering such words of love that reason should desert me along with all else except my love and desire for her. I push my tongue up into her, find the spot that makes her breath catch and her fingers clench. I wrap my hands around her and draw her even tighter to me, my arms capturing her legs against my sides. Sarah's heat and fragrance surround me. My tongue edges higher into her channel then retreats. I begin firm, fast thrusts that rub against the spot that drives Sarah crazy with need. Her fingers dig into me through the silk, the state of her dress obviously no longer a consideration. I chuckle. God, I adore this woman!

Sarah's hand grips mine through her silk and lace, squeezing almost painfully as she comes. She laughs and kisses me tenderly when I try to straighten out her skirt but make a mess of it. We return to the sanctuary and rejoin the others though we sit a few rows away. It's an easy compromise, separated but not isolated and alone.

There is no reason to believe a miracle will save us, no reason to hope, to look to a future that will do otherwise than grow darker until some black maw claims us all. Sarah's hand in mine is asking if I still believe. My fingers intertwine with hers, my thumb strokes softly. My other hand caresses our child. I nod and smile. I am not insane; I believe. I kiss my wife and wait for my next miracle.

 

 

~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~

 

 

**Maybe it _is_ the end of the world, but I still gotta smile with all this love and..and gratitude I feel.** That beautiful, intelligent, caring, wonderful woman in the aisle bawlin' her eyes out for the Doctor is my own little girl all grown up. Dense old Pete, I should have twigged the moment Rose came flyin' at me like a madwoman and bloody near cracked my skull open like an egg on the street–didn't I have a gammy back my entire honeymoon from that same flyin' Tyler love tackle?

That's my own little Rose, my… daughter. Come from the future in a time machine, she did, and saved my worthless life. Lord, but I love her even so.

All the death…

This whole flippin' disaster is my fault no matter what the Doctor said, and now it's up to me to fix it. I'm not meant to be alive, and those things won't be satisfied until they eat us all or I make amends with what should'ave been. The Doctor sussed it all out right away. But he is… he was too much in love with Rose to hurt her with what needs to be done.

My trouble is whingin' at me again. But even louder than _Her Ladyship_ is this nigglin' in my useless brain what's been sayin' Pete you sad git, add up what you've seen and what you've heard and what's goin' on around you! The Doctor talkin' about time bein' ripped. My time-travelin' daughter Rose tellin' me her daddy stories that Jackie wouldn't 'ave bought even on our wedding night with half a bottle of red in her. That car that keeps appearin' and the way the Doctor didn't look at me when he said it wasn't important. I'm scared to death, I am, but I'm not barkin' am I? There's fuck-all else it can be.

And the Doctor, him standin' courageously and dyin' for us with a last lovin' look at my Rose, well…our Rose. I heard him tryin' to bite back a cry of what had to be colossal agony when the monster got him. Then… Blimey! There was a burst of somethin' that wasn't lights, not unless lights can scream and twist like a waterspout, and I felt like someone dropped me headfirst into one of them particle accelerators. Then I had visions, and my brain exploded–-

 

_~~^~~ street corner two in the morning, Sarah Clarke rummages through her pockets for money for a taxi; her back is to the street as Stuart Hoskins walks past ~~^~~ but Stuart stops to ask Sarah if she needs help and hails a cab for her ~~^~~ and he writes his phone number on her hand; she washes it off when she gets home ~~^~~ but the cab slides in the thin slippery film of water and petrol residue left by a light rain, runs the curb, striking Sarah ~~^~~ but Stuart pushes Sarah out of the way and is struck and killed ~~^~~ but the cab driver swerves into the brick wall to miss them; at the perimeter of explosion and death, Sarah and Stuart clutch each other's hands ~~^~~ but Sarah…_

_~~^~~ Pete marries Jackie; Rose, their daughter, grows up into the most beautiful and intelligent woman ~~^~~ and Pete tells her so as he walks her down the aisle and gives her with a father's bittersweet willingness to her partner in Tyler & Smith Pediatrics ~~^~~ but he buries his teen-aged Rose, drowned jumping into the Thames to save the life of a stranger ~~^~~ but Rose and he fight alongside a tall stranger with sad blue eyes to save Earth from creatures Pete can't believe in but knows he must ~~^~~ but Rose grows up without him; Jackie is mum and dad and Pete is gone ~~^~~ run out on them, leaving them penniless and on the street ~~^~~ but he cares for her and her little sister on his own, left by Jackie for philandering ~~^~~ for a rich man who uses and abuses her ~~^~~ for a man who loves her more than he and treats her better and Pete drinks himself into oblivion ~~^~~ becomes the man he should have been ~~^~~ runs in front of a suddenly appearing car, dying alone~~^~~ drenched in the hot tears of a brown-eyed girl and a silent promise from a sad blue-eyed man…_

_Pete Tyler's mind swims with stupefying possibilities, and through all of it his Rose baby/toddler/growing/grown/given in marriage/abandoned is watched over lovingly by sad blue eyes ~~^~~ but collapses in horror-stricken anguish, watching the key in her hand turn cold and dead, while her mum and dad fail to comfort her and a chapel grows colder… ~~^~~_

 

–- and maybe I've gone bloody mental after all, but I know things I shouldn't, and I hear my Jackie behind me cryin' out for her Rose, her voice full of shock and recognition, and she rushes past me to the woman that Jackie finally susses our little girl will grow into if we get through this alive.

Rose won't let either of us comfort her, she just kneels there like that, full of despair and pain. Jackie starts to make a thing of it. I want to laugh and tease my Jacks how she's gone from jealous wife to overbearing mum in a flash of lightnin', but I've got better things to say to her. She slaps me a good one as I drag her out of the sanctuary. God love her, she wouldn't be my Jacks if she didn't get one off when she could!

**_"I'm meant to be dead, Jackie."_ **

 

 

~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~

 

 

**I almost died a thousand times today, no word of a lie!** First Pete brings a date to the wedding– some little bint who's wearin' too much make-up and clothes that are so wrong for a wedding in so many ways I think that anyone who sees her has to think, like, well anyway she acts like she's one sandwich short of a picnic, and I almost have an attack because the wanker's throwing this tart at me right in front of my friends and my little Rose like he's got no shame. Then I'm attacked and almost eaten by gigantic black monster things. There's this bloke who acts like he knows what to do, but what _Doctor Smart-Arse_ really knows mostly is to how to be a flippin' bastard. Maybe he saves us outside a little.

So we have to sit in this dark, cold church for hours and hours, me in my ugly bridesmaid dress and some big hair that cost me a week's pay and doesn't even stay right even with a can of that expensive spray Sarah's mum gave me, sweet thing that she is, it's not her fault she got Sonny thrown in as part of the bargain though not any more. But now Sarah and Stuart aren't gettin' married because Father O'Brien went and got himself eaten by the monsters jus' like Sonny.

When Pete isn't holdin' hands with what I'd been thinkin' was his latest bit of stuff, he's slinkin' off with her. Well, I had it up to here with him, and Lord I don't know why but I swore on the Bible on the seat in front of me that even Jesus wouldn't be able to get him out of this one alive. The skiver comes back with some stupid excuse out of Red Dwarf and I start to picture the smeghead with an _H_ on his forehead and the delight I'd take in puttin' it there. That's when the Doctor come at me like he's gonna wrap his hands round my throat, and we're all screamin' and Pete gives big Rose my baby and the Doctor gets himself eaten. Then Pete goes and tells me he's meant to be dead. He's always been one for drama, Pete. I tell him he's daft as a brush.

But he looked at me, Pete did, and shook his head. And of course I already knew it's true.

Somethin' happened to me when the Doctor got eaten by that monster, somethin' I can't explain and it scares the shit outta me, but I know things now, some wonderful like that Rose is our daughter, and some I wish I didn't, like my Pete was supposed to die in a car accident before the weddin'.

I told Pete to shut it because that's what I say to him when he talks out of his arse. But he wasn't. He wasn't. He tried to explain that he has to go and throw himself in front of a car to save the world and me and our daughter. I wanted to say somethin' shirty, I did, but the fight had gone out of me, all of it. Pete has to do this.

I got my arms around his neck like I can hold him back from dyin' and I'm fightin' not to fall down. Pete is bein' brave and strong and noble for me and our Rose, and I feel I have to be it right back at him. That's not us, though, it's not! And it's not fair! He's reckless and fearless and a hopeless, good-for-nothin' dreamer, Pete, and he never knew the end of a sentence he was sayin' until he got there. And me, I guess I go for the slap so's I'm the one givin' gyp instead of gettin' it.

_"Jacks, I have to do this. Remember I love you. I've never loved any woman more, and I swear there was never anyone held my fancy after you took my hand and tied the knot …"_

He gives me that _'til death us do part_ look of his and it's too much, so I get snarky for once. _"Should've tied it around your neck, only spot fittin' to hold down a plonker like you."_

_"Anywhere you want to put it, I'm sure I deserve it, Jacqueline Suzanne Suzette Anita."_

Trust that worthless sod to go and say somethin' romantic and fearless! And that's it, because I'm not strong enough or stupid enough to argue about his worthless daydreamin' when it's that what made me fall in love with him in the first place.

_"Oh my Pete!"_

I want to tell Pete he's my world, but how's he gonna believe me after everything and all? But…but maybe he knows. Maybe he's always known, I think, because his eyes spark as he asks if I can abide him through one more of his daft schemes and I'm having trouble breathing because I know that look. So I slap him but not for real. He caresses my cheek, and even though we're out of time, Pete and me, and even though it is the Lord's house, it's right. I think maybe _because_ it is the House of our Lord, and He's the God of Love, it's not just right, it's _Right_ and all…like making Devotions?

_"Jacks, I know how much you love that 'do you got. I promise I won't mess it up."_

I slap his shoulder hard because… well just because I'm me and that's what I do even when... even … I don't know, I jus' want so bad for things to be normal again. _"You're gonna make a bloody mess of my expensive big hair an' everythin', Pete Tyler, you plonker, and don't we both know it!"_ Pete smiles. If there's one thing my Pete always was… is... it's imaginative.

_"Dad? Mum?"_

The heavy oak door of Father O'Brien's study muffles Rose's voice, but I can hear her–the big Rose. Guess I'm attuned to my baby's voice, no matter.

_"You in there, Mum?"_

_"Not now, Rose!"_ I roll my eyes, and Pete laughs and kisses me.

_"Mum, Stuart said to tell you the baby is cryin' and he can't get her to stop."_

My Pete makes a soft chuckle, kinda beaten, and moves to open the door. But I stop him.

_"I promise you on my life, Pete Tyler, our little Rose will be comfortable and happy whatever I have to do to give that to her. So right now she can put up a bit longer with a wet nappy."_

He laughs and he grabs me back to him.

My arms wrap around Pete's neck again, but different than before. Pete's arms go round my waist and he pulls me against him. The kiss starts slow, tender and worshipful like the first time he got up the nerve, but we both know the last kiss can't be anythin' like the first. There's love in it, but it's desperate because it's bein' broke by things we can't beat. There's faith that's gotten kinda rickety because I think we put too much weight against it and didn't try to prop it up. There's lots of shattered hopes and dead-end promises, I know. But there is passion and need and a sad sad love. We put it all into that kiss and the kiss into the only future Pete and me have left together.

But it's not long enough! God in Heaven I want my Pete–oh I want him for me and for our baby daughter! I know it hurts him like nothin' else that he can't give it to us. I won't hurt him more by breakin' down. So when he says it's time, I tell him he's a drama queen.

_"You've waited a long time for this, Jacks. This is the day I finally get it right. Now I'm gonna be a proper husband and father, gonna give you and our Rose the life you deserve."_

I know the answer, but I can't stop myself from askin'. _"There isn't another way?"_ Pete shakes his head.

_"Don't you believe in miracles, Peter Tyler?"_

Pete tells me it's because he believes in miracles that he can do this. I grab him again, him all put together and lookin' quite the handsome stud. I pull his face down, and kiss the wanker within an inch of– Damn.

I kiss my husband with all the passion I ever felt for him still flamin' inside me.

_"I love you, Pete."_

I say it first, not because I want to prove somethin', but I figure him going off to save the world, he should get the last word this time. I smile and wait for it. He wouldn't be Pete if he wasn't playin' an angle. He doesn't disappoint. Actually, he never did, not in the big things.

He tells me he loves me, my Pete, and he knows I love him, but I gotta promise to find a bloke I can love more than him. That's an easy promise–there's no such person, never gonna be. Then Pete makes me promise not to watch.

 

  

~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~

 

**_"Go to him. Quick!"_ **

 

~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~

 

 

**I watched my father die.** I held his hand and kissed him, and I told him I loved him, and I watched him die. The Doctor stood behind me the whole time. I've faced down Gelth and Slitheen and a crazy Dalek, but there's nothin' worse than seein' someone you love die. I reached back and clutched his hand, I..I had to. I didn't know if he'd let me, if he'd even want me to touch him after what I had done. But I needed to prove to myself that he was alive.

I could feel the Doctor's honest sorrow for my dad through our linked hands, and also the strength of whatever this is he feels for me–and blimey, my heart still hopes it's love even though I know I don't deserve it. He kept hold of my hand all the way back to the TARDIS, too, even though I didn't deserve that either. We both know I don't deserve it. He died. I'd killed him. I killed my Doctor. He died tryin' to save us all from the Reapers, but it was me that made them come, and I wish– The Doctor always says to be careful what I wish for. I didn't realize. I didn't think.

Why did I say all those horrible things to him? Why did I try to hurt him? I made him run away from me. I wish I hadn't, I wish I knew why I did it, I wish...

If it had to come to all that it did, or else me never knowin' the Doctor–never hurtin' him, never makin' him suffer and die, never… _oh God!_ never lovin' him, never bein' his lover, then I wish the Doctor had never found me in Henricks basement. I wish the Autons had gotten me first.

When the Doctor forgave me in the church, all I wanted was to go down on him, yeah, to tell him how much I love him the only way I know I can do without it bein' domestic. I..I really wanted to say _I love you._ I want so much to tell him, but saying the words then seemed like just a way to try to con him into being not so angry and hurt by what I did. The first time I say it to him I want him to know that I mean it from my heart. 'Sides, you don't go down on someone in a church, right? But I wanted to. I think Dad and Mum bein' there kept me from draggin' the Doctor into some room, lockin' the door, and tellin' every part of his body with every part of mine what he means to me. It's a different morality out here, but not around your parents. Still I wanted–cor blimey, how I wanted! If I'd have known what was gonna happen with the Reapers I… well, I mean… I wish.

He's not lookin' at me, just movin' around mumblin' to himself, writin' in his beautiful Gallifreyan script, makin' adjustments in the controls, flippin' switches and pushin' buttons. God, he's gorgeous; I could sit and watch him forever! Is he takin' me back home? I don't want to live my life without him, but it's his TARDIS and his choice, and I have no place to argue with the designated driver.

Even so, I'm not gonna let him take me to Mum's until I'm sure he's ok. He's an alien, but I can tell when he's hurtin', or at least I know when he's hidin' somethin'. Like when he grins like a madman it means somethin's gone pear-shaped and he doesn't have a clue how he's gonna fix it. Or like when he says he's ok but he won't let me touch him and he runs away, it means he's badly injured. Or like… Sometimes he looks at me a certain way, his eyes are kissin' me as softly as his lips do, and I think maybe he does love me. Maybe because he's an alien he doesn't feel love like I do. Or maybe on his planet the men didn't say it first. Or maybe they showed it differently, like, maybe like by holdin' hands? Yeah, maybe he's been tellin' me all along and the TARDIS doesn't translate that either? Maybe he–

Maybe somethin' and maybe somethin' else and I'm bloody tired of all the maybes! I love the git and he's drivin' me mental! Does he feel? Bollocks. Does he?

Sod this! I lost him once today. If I lose him now, it won't be because I'm too scared to lay it all on the line to try to keep him.

 

 

~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~

 

 

As he moved around the central control, the Doctor felt Rose's stare following him. It felt like a caress, but he wouldn't juice the TARDIS on the certainty; when you've been dead like he had recently been, Reality seems a little off when you get back. And there was the fact of him walking out on her, killing off her dad, and just being a bloody arsehole to her in general.

The Doctor kept his back to the jump seat where Rose sat and didn't look at her once. What he was about to do was right, the Doctor knew it was right. He knew he could fix the time line without bringing down the Reapers or hurting anything that mattered. But he couldn't look at Rose. Leaving her hurt as much as losing Gallifrey.

"Doctor."

Rose's voice and her hand on his arm made the Doctor jump. He covered his despair with gruffness. "Rose, change your clothes and get something to eat."

"W-what about you?" Rose had decided to wing it, but she thought that was soddin' pathetic even for a pet rock.

"I have some work to do here."

"You're takin' me back home now, aren't you–because I'm not the best. Maybe I was once, but not anymore, and I don't think you'd argue it with me again, Doctor. I'm a selfish, thoughtless, stupid ape. I _swear_ I didn't plan it, I swear I came with you to _be with you_ ; but it doesn't make a difference. When I saw my dad, all of a sudden nothing else mattered–not the world, not the things you warned me not to do, not… n-not even you. _I could save the world but lose you_ , you said to me in Number 10. I said horrible, hateful things to you. I almost destroyed the world. Doctor, you died because of me! The only reason you're alive now is that you made somethin' happen and then my dad saved you and everyone in the other time line."

The Doctor let go a string of Gallifreyan exclamations that the TARDIS didn't translate.

"Rose, you _are_ the best, and if you make us have this discussion one more time, I'm gonna track down a pair of your knickers, tie your ankles together, and hang you out the airlock until you apologize for doubting my faith in you." He grinned widely. " _And_ for making me break my own _no knickers_ rule."

The Doctor had thought it would make Rose roll her eyes, maybe even laugh. Instead, she started to cry. Caught on the wrong foot, he drew her to him and kissed the top of her head. "Oh, Rose," he said softly, gently wiping her tears with his thumbs. "He's your dad–of course when you saw a chance to save him you would try. It's part of having a loving, human heart. Any idiot would have realized that right off. It takes someone really clever to muck things up as badly as I did." That finally got him an eye roll. He had to smile.

"What's goin' on, Doctor?"

"The Reapers are opportunists. Things like paradoxes, or eddies in the time stream, or an open corner in a tesseract attract them the way you attract pretty boys. The Time Lords didn't let those parasites get away with anything. But my people are gone now and the Reapers have become brazen. Two sets of us being there made the time line vulnerable to them; they were able to slip in and do their damage at the weakest point, which was your father surviving the accident.

"As I keep telling you, I am not just clever–I'm a genius! I've found a time line where your father survives and the world survives. Even better, Rose Tyler, your parents' marriage survives." The Doctor threw Rose his fake fantastic grin. "Yep, saw Peter and Jackie Tyler and their daughters Rose Marion and Suzette Anita, at Disney World, at university graduation, on holidays. You grow up happy, Rose, and then you happily raise a family with your husband, who's an important brain surgeon saving lives just like you." He rolled his eyes–big so she couldn't miss it. "And Rose, he's more than a little bit pretty."

But then he smiled at Rose, a sincere, heartsfelt smile full of love and pride, and cupped her cheek. "And you! Doctor Rose Tyler, paediatrician. And you are a very impressive field doctor doing so much good in the world with _Doctors Without Borders_."

"What, really?"

The Doctor nodded, eyes bright with his emotions, throat too full of them, too, to trust himself to speak.

"But wh..where are you and the TARDIS?"

The Doctor looked up to the cosmos and concentrated. He cleared his throat. "Two galaxies over saving a planet of little blue puffy muppets from themselves."

"You're not…? We're not…?"

"Tell you what, Rose Tyler: I promise I'll break out of prison in time for the conferring of your Post Doctorate, yeah." He grinned but turned away quickly, before Rose could figure–

"Even if you're there, I won't know you, will I? I won't have met you, will I, Doctor? Or maybe you don't come back to ask again because I'm not the best, no matter what you say. I did somethin' awful and dangerous. I almost destroyed the Earth. I killed a lot of people."

"Rose!" The Doctor found himself actually growing angry. "Rose Tyler, didn't I just tell you–"

"Doctor, I killed you."

"Oi! Still here." The Doctor _thrumped_ himself on the chest with his thumb. "Still ready to get those knickers out and use them on you with no orgasmic intent," he warned hotly.

"It hurt a lot, didn't it," Rose asked quietly.

"Nah," he said, his anger suddenly gone. "Not so much as you'd think."

"Doctor, please tell me the truth."

The Doctor sighed. "It took less than a second so it didn't even register it was happening. I was in the church and then I wasn't. Kinda like being caught in the maws of a black hole, you know: you're cruising space, feel a bit of tidal pressure pulling on your insides; flash of light, flash of black, then nothing."

The Doctor gave Rose another of his fake grins, the one that hadn't fooled her since after they'd come back from Van Statten's bunker and Rose had found him leaning on his sink, barely able to stand.

"I heard you scream, Doctor. I'll never forget that. I…I'm so… I…" Tears came, unstoppable. The thoughts that did make sense made Rose sick. She couldn't breathe. Her lungs wouldn't work, her heart wouldn't beat, and her left palm was empty and cold and itching for the Doctor's right one.

But that last thing Rose could fix. She wrapped her fingers through his and slid their palms together. She still half thought he'd pull away. He didn't. Rose tightened her grip.

The Doctor's fingers squeezed Rose's reflexively. They were strong and gentle, emphatic and possessing.

Just like always.

And that made Rose stop trembling and put her brain in gear.

"Genius Time Lord are you? Oi, you think you're so bloody clever! Listen to what I have to say, then look me in the eyes and tell me that changin' my timeline is the right thing to do." Rose took one quick breath and went for broke. "I love you, Doctor. I've loved you from the moment you took my hand and said _run_." She felt the Doctor's fingers spasm but didn't let go and didn't give him a chance to break in and stop her. "I'm not askin' you for anythin'. No that's not true, I'm askin'… I'm beggin' you not to make me leave you. But I am not askin' you to say it back to me, or to try to feel anythin' like that for me, and I don't expect us to do anythin' domestic or–"

The Doctor exploded. "Not do anything domestic, Rose!"

He was the Oncoming Storm; and when he exploded, it was like the expansion of a super-nova, or the white fountain at the back side of a black hole. It was more than a little like the birth of the universe–or maybe that was _exactly_ what it was. It was everything from nothing–it was BIG. But it was also sloppy, and the Doctor looked really silly because it was a burst of such pure happiness that it took more than a moment to get through him, and then a bit more for his body to start functioning again. It took him, clever, bemused Time Lord that he was, even longer to realize what it was. He was happy. Honestly, truly happy.

With a _whoop_ , the Doctor wrapped his arms around Rose, lifted her and began to spin her wildly, swinging her body around him like Rose was a comet sweeping around a star, forever held in orbit by its gravity. He was fully aware of the irony–it was the other way around, the Doctor knew, it had been since Henricks.

He didn't stop spinning them until Rose's feet almost kissed the console, but only because he was afraid he'd break her in his joy. (And then the TARDIS would do more than break him.) He put Rose down, changed his hold on her just enough to press her seamlessly against him, and kissed her with tender adoration. Fuelled by a dizzying mix of joy and hope that he'd been afraid to let himself feel before, the kiss grew and deepened, igniting with a passion that left them both reeling with a burgeoning, burning need.

"Rose Tyler, I love you so much I did domestic with you in your mum's flat the day after I met you, and I did it in front of her flat and on the roof of her flat and along a stairway of her flat. I've done domestic with you standing up, lying down, and everything in between, in all kinds of gravity and that time we were weightless. Done it in the distant future, we have, and the fairly distant past, and more than once in spacio-temporal abatement. I remember one time I pitched backwards off a coral strut, landed on my head, and dislocated a shoulder; but I got up and did domestic with you again in order to stop you choking to death from laughing.

"We did domestic in every room of Number 10 and a few of the closets. Did it in front of one Harriet Jones MP, now PM, in an alternate time line with a missile on the way. Did it… " The Doctor rolled his eyes and huffed. "It might be easier to list where and when we haven't done it, but that's just because we haven't gotten to those places yet. I have been domestic with you from the moment you came back to Henricks for me against my instructions and saved me and almost made me blow us both up along with the Autons."

The Doctor caressed Rose's cheek, marvelling as he always did that it was a perfect fit for his palm. Then he took her hands in his.

"Look at me, Rose Tyler: I am an ancient Time Lord, a very _very_ old dog set in his ways. I come from a people for whom _doing domestic_ meant making sure the sash of Rassilon was ready for the President to wear to the High Council's ceremonies and, sometimes, removing a stain or two. Our idea of acceptable personal intimacy was helping each other into our ornate and ridiculously cumbersome robes and headgear. _Scoring_? _Getting a leg over_? Weren't those something to do with a football match on Earth? _Love_?" The Doctor snorted. " _Rassilon!_ , I've no doubt these feelings I have for you would have fried the Matrix.

"Do you get it yet, Rose? Shagging you isn't simply shagging you–it's me loving you totally and with both my hearts and all of my being. Maybe it's because I love you like I've never loved anyone, and never thought I could, that I want to be with you and do domestic with you for the rest of our lives!"

It sank in for both of them at about the same time that they had just admitted how much they loved each other. Having finally voiced it, their mouths seemed stuck in neutral. So experienced in shagging each other over the moon, in chucking innuendo back and forth, in voicing everything except what they were saying while saying it in every other way possible, they could only stand and stare at each other awkwardly… until Rose elbowed the Doctor and gave him a fine stroppy look. The Doctor saw her look with a smug look of his own and raised her a wicked eye roll. Rose's tongue peeked out the left side of her irresistible grin, thereby winning her the hand, the round, the pot, the Doctor's crazy-in-love white flag smile... and then a blast of hearty laughter.

"Your mum goes on about powerful alien probes, but she doesn’t know the half of it. The TARDIS loves you, too, you know; otherwise we'd never be allowed to shag in the control room. Even she can't resist that smile of yours. You wield that tongue, Ms. Tyler, and you have two superior life forms at your mercy."

"You mean to say my alien probe is more impressive than yours, Doctor?"

"From the moment it made its presence known." The Doctor smiled tenderly and kissed Rose again.

Rose caressed the beloved face that appeared so handsomely human, looked into ancient alien eyes full of mirth and tenderness, and a happiness that Rose felt smugly responsible for. Her thumb was inevitably drawn to the softest, most sensual lips she'd ever seen, ever been kissed by–lips that needed only to touch her lightly to make her feel like the center of the universe. "So, you decided to leave the time line be, yeah Doctor?"

The Doctor sucked Rose's thumb into his mouth, stroked it with his tongue, and thought himself quite the impressive bloke for the long, sweet moan that his little action had elicited from Rose. His tongue moved on to Rose's palm and fingers, and the Doctor proved himself even more impressive before he let her hand go.

"One thing about that time line we just left, Rose," the Doctor remarked, "your mum finally did as I told her. Think it could ever happen here?"

Rose snorted. The Doctor pursed his lips into a right sulk.

"If that's what you really want, Doctor, maybe you just should–"

The Doctor stopped Rose's mouth by sticking his tongue in it and tormenting hers. She cradled his package in her perfectly fitting hand and rocked herself against him.

When they finally broke for air, the Doctor wiped away the last of Rose's tears. "Think I should bring your mum wine and flowers when we go there for dinner?" he mumbled between nibbles on her ear. "My relationship with her seems to work better when I keep her gobsmacked and off-balance."

Rose's lips skimmed over the Doctor's. "You got _me_ gobsmacked and off-balance, Doctor. Will it be wine and flowers for me too, then?"

"Rose Tyler, I have other things planned for you."

"You think you're so impressive!"

The Doctor said something in Gallifreyan.

The TARDIS didn't translate.

The Doctor did. "What's so impressive is the way you make me feel good about being alive. I love you, Rose."

 

  

~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~v~~^~~

 

  

They cuddled in bed, wrapped in each other's sleepy embrace. Rose's head fit perfectly into the nook made by the Doctor's right shoulder, neck and chin. Their legs were quietly and contentedly entangled, their sated bodies disinclined to move in more than placid acquiescence to the need to breathe.

The Doctor's left hand found its way into Rose's hair. Almost idly his fingers combed through her long waves, worked a tangle or two, twisted the ends into corkscrews, and smoothed the individual ribbons of marigold yellow into a silky mantle of solidified sunlight that he draped off of Rose's exquisite long neck onto the pillow. He whispered his fingertips over the pale expanse of skin he'd exposed and heard Rose sigh. He kissed the top of her head.

After a bit the Doctor's restless fingers began to move over Rose's neck and shoulders, down her arms, her back… covering her in Gallifreyan script from head to hip. Rose stretched languorously, somehow both pressing forward into the Doctor's body and arching more fully into his slow, sultry graffiti. Nuzzling into the hollow of his throat, she swirled her tongue in his exotic taste. Then she pressed her lips to him and sighed contentedly. Her fingertips moved over his cool skin, duplicating the whorls and circles and arcs of Gallifreyan that the Doctor had been scribbling over her body. With a cheeky smile Rose added something extra and patted the Doctor's bum. He laughed and tweaked her nipple between two fingers. Rose's body jolted against the Doctor. The firm, hot presence that had grown between them responded just as strongly and they both moaned.

"You're getting very good at it," the Doctor noted as he scribbled his reply on Rose's bum. "You must have been practicing on your own."

"Good at what?" Rose asked innocently. "Because, if you mean–"

The Doctor jammed his thigh between Rose's legs and dragged his knee over her clitoris almost roughly. Her body jolted again and she gasped. He wrapped Rose in his arms as she began to move against him in short rhythmic undulations. Like tidewaters rippling onto a beach and out, Rose's body slid up and down the Doctor's thigh. The Doctor was caught in his lover's tidal pull, hopelessly and happily drowning in Rose Tyler. They moved against each other reflexively until the Doctor rolled onto his back with her and aligned their bodies, Rose's heat against his, yin and yang at the edge of merging. His fingers glided over the curve of Rose's arse. Her legs fell open and his hand moved lower. Rose's slick fragrance ran into the Doctor's hand and dripped through his fingers. His erection twitched again, hotter and harder between their bodies, and the Doctor's own desire spilled onto their skin.

He wrote more Gallifreyan on Rose's slick skin–mostly just doodles, really, but by the time he was finished, Rose was moaning loudly, digging her fingers into his arms, and nipping hard enough to make him want to shout. He was ready to flip Rose onto her back, throw her legs over his shoulders, and pound into her. He wanted nothing so much as to abandon every fragment of thought and all his Time Lord self-control, and lose himself… no, the Doctor realized, _find_ himself in Rose. Her body was soft and warm and yielding, her center was tight and hot. Rose Tyler was exciting and giving and loving. And she was terrifying in all the feelings she aroused in him. He thanked Rassilon he was finally able to admit them to her, though he was fairly certain that wasn't something that the supercilious all-knowing old sod would want to be thanked for. The Doctor choked out an oath, his mind drawn back to the breathlessly moaning woman in his arms who had complete and unquestionable possession of his hearts… and his package.

Rose caressed and kneaded the Doctor's sac with exquisite expertise, pumped his member, and strummed her nail over the swollen, hyper-responsive head. The Doctor pushed two long fingers inside her, grinding his knuckles against her swollen clitoris. Rose began to mumble as he angled to reach those places that would make his lover lose control in the most fantastic way. Suddenly Rose clenched hard around his fingers. Her fingers convulsed around his member and sac. He gasped and shouted something in garbled Gallifreyan that ended with her name. Then he chuckled. "Think this part of you is ready again. Shame you don't have respiratory bypass."

"Try me," Rose challenged.

"Your wish is my command."

"Should I be careful what I wish for?"

"Too late for that, Rose Tyler." The Doctor wrapped his hands around Rose's hips and positioned her for joining.

Rose's hands covered the Doctor's. "Remember what you told me 'bout black holes, Doctor? I remember. You get too close to the gravity well and it sucks you in. You can't fight and you can't resist, it's grabbed ahold of you hard, pullin' at you…suckin' you… drawin' you into it. And as the tidal forces pull you, the need to explode into a string of particles grows, it's all you're aware of and it's gettin' unbearable, and you know you're comin' apart. Jus' before you're swallowed up completely, somethin' inside you finally gives and you explode. You explode and shatter. It takes just a moment, Doctor, just a moment for you to shatter. But see, you got yourself sucked into an event horizon and lookin' at it another way, you're explodin' and explodin' and that moment you shatter is gonna last forever."

"You talking about wanting me to shag you until I split you, Rose Tyler?" the Doctor asked with a grin, flipping them over, ready to draw Rose's legs up and implement his master plan.

"No, Doctor." Rose's fingers ran through the Doctor's close-cropped hair, behind his ears, over his cheekbones and jaw, a long, loving caress. "I'm talkin' about me stayin' with you and lovin' you forever, Doctor... and it doesn't matter how long or how short the time is, because it'll always be forever."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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This story archived at <http://www.whofic.com/viewstory.php?sid=55257>

 


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